Saturday, October 14, 2006

Mushroom Bread

Saturday, October 14, 2006

The good news is that I have a working stove. The bad news is that my KitchenAid mixer gave up the ghost just as I was starting to mix the mushroom bread dough and it is now in the Appliance Hospital, from where it should return, assuming that its illness is not fatal, within a few weeks. We had to take it all the way to Blaine, a far northern suburb of Minneapolis, which feels like a foreign country. Instead of the "Impeach Bush" and "Peace Now" signs, which dot the landscape of my cozy south Minneapolis neighborhood, there were "Guns Don't Kill, People Kill" and "If You Don't Speak English, Get the F... Out" bumper stickers. But the people in the repair shop seemed competent and not at all hostile, so it wasn't painful to leave my mixer out in the suburbs.I hadn't even thought about the possibility of my mixer going kaput. I was only worried about what pan to use for the mushroom bread. Rose recommends a lovely glass bread steamer, but the company that makes it seems to have gone out of business, and I couldn't find another bread steamer to buy. (Don't people in Boston bake steamed bread any more?) As a second choice, she recommends a one-pound coffee can. But I don't buy coffee in cans, and neither does anyone else I know. I hated to buy a can of Folger's just to make this mushroom bread. I did have an empty plum tomato can that I had used a few weeks ago, and I saved that can in case I couldn't come up with anything else.One day at work when I was complaining about my lack of appropriate baking equipment for this bread, my friend Susan asked me to explain what I wanted. I told her about the bread, and how it was supposed to turn into a mushroom shape as it rose and then as it baked. She asked me if I really felt the need to commemorate North Korea's atomic bomb by making a mushroom-shaped bread. Very funny, I said. But from then on I started to think of this as my Great Leader bread.Well, when my KitchenAid died, I panicked for a moment, trying to figure out how I was going to bake bread without my heavy-duty mixer. Fortunately, it occurred to me fairly quickly that I could do it the old-fashioned way, which was really rather nice and satisfying. Still, I think I will concentrate in the next few weeks on the few remaining breads that don't need a mixer.And how did the bread turn out, you may ask? The bread itself was actually anti-climactic after the worries about the pan and the dead mixer. It turned out to be a very flavorful bread because it's made with nearly a pound of mushrooms, diced and reduced into duxelles. Jim and I had one slice with butter and one with leftover roasted garlic. It was a draw. We considered trying a third slice with olive oil, and voting again, but our better selves took over.I would definitely make the mushroom bread again, but I wouldn't use the tomato can next time. The "stem" was too long for the "cap", and, while the top browned nicely, the stem remained lily-white. I didn't pack the tomato can completely full of dough, so I made some dinner rolls with the leftover dough. They're now in the freezer, waiting to be pulled out some night when I make a pot of soup for dinner. I don't know if the shape of the bread would have been better or worse if I had put all the dough in the can, and I don't think I will ever find out.

11 comments:

Nice! When I tried this bread, I made smaller loaves using terra cotta flowerpots that I seasoned with oil first. They work really well for these kinds of breads and are cheaply procured from the any friendly neighborhood hardware store.

I am a profamateur baker (I don't have any formal training, but I make and sell bread) and I make an average of about 140+ loaves of bread a week. I had a Kitchenaid too, in fact, two of them. The original was about 22 years old; my mom purchased it when I was a child, and I used this to start out with my bread-baking business. I quickly outgrew this one, so I invested in a 5 quart professional Kitchenaid, thinking it would be the same quality mixer as the older one. It constantly overheated, even though I never overloaded it and always kneaded the dough on #2 speed. So I decided to look outside the world of Kitchenaid and bought a $500 Electrolux Assistent (that's the correct spelling)based on the recommendations of various strangers on the internet. They were right; the instructions are less than verbose and it is a bit less straight forward as to the usage than the Kitchenaid, but I cannot emphasize how much I LOVE this machine. No overheating! And larger batches! I can mix a 12 lb batch of dough with no problem. I use it 3 days a week now, mixing 10-12 lb batches of dough all day long and it never so much as gives a hint that it's getting overworked. And single batches are so much faster to mix than in a K'aid. So if you ever decide that you want something more out of a mixer, google Electrolux Assistent and read the reviews. My only regret is that I didn't buy it sooner!

ChubbyPanda,The idea of using terra cotta flower pots is brilliant! I would never have thought of that. When I was putting the bread in the tomato can, it did occur to me that this bread might work very well as miniature loaves. I found some tin Baba molds at Williams-Sonoma that would probably work like your flower pots. I may get the Baba molds, and then I'd have something to make babas in, if the mood ever struck me.

Thanks for the information about the Electrolux Assistent. I've never even heard of it. I was thinking that my next splurge would be the heavy-duty KitchenAid, but now I'll check into the Electrolux too. I love being able to use a mixer to knead bread, but I have been disappointed in the quality of the KitchenAid--there's one bolt that I have to keep an eye on because otherwise it keeps falling out!

I have a question about duxelles-I thought this was a paste resulting from the long, slow cooking of the minced mushrooms in the butter. The recipe does not indicate making a paste-is this a misprint? I did not see a correction on the official list on the website, and Ms. Beranbaum is on vacation and not answering questions on her website.Thanks,Texas

Texas,The mushrooms are minced and cooked for an hour, and mixed in with the bread dough in step 3. Even after an hour of cooking, they didn't really turn into a paste; they retained a little shape. I hope this helps.

Thank you so much for your very quick reply! I made the bread, and it was spectacular as are all of Ms. Beranbaum's breads.

I made a double recipe and did not portion it ideally, so my cap was a little small. I had a number of nice little rolls, though, until my sly puppy stole reached up with his paws, pulled the baking sheet on the counter towards himeself and ate 5 of them while they were still warm. He has excellent taste!

I wanted to know if when you make the breads that are not in loaf pans if they rise as high as what is noted in the recipes? Mine tend to be greater in diameter and not as high even if I shape them tight. I am in Houston where the humidity is always very high, so perhaps this causes the dough to be heavier. I am not sure.

Texas,Yes, my boules and batards usually rise as much as they're supposed to. I have more trouble with the loaves I make in loaf pans--they never seem to get as high as the directions say they will. Come to think of it, my standard loaf pan might be a little bigger than the one Rose recommends--I've never measured it.Thanks!